West London based Sant Kaur Bajwa, who at the age of 115 years and 199 days, was officially the UK’s oldest and the world’s 2nd oldest person, passed away of natural causes, on Friday 19th July.

Sant Kaur Bajwa was born on 1st January 1898 in Sialkote, Punjab, (in what is now Pakistan), in a small village called Monde ke Mazeera. She lived through three centuries,two World Wars, the Industrial and Technological revolutions, and outlived a total of six monarchs and 27 Prime Ministers of England.

Despite her tough childhood, having lost both parents young, she was raised by her older sister who helped her become the woman that she is today. At the age of 16, she married a farmer and gave birth to four children. Unfortunately further tragedy followed Sant Kaur, with the death of her husband Munsha Singh six years after her marriage in 1914.

In 1947, shortly after India gained independence, and the partition, she was forced to migrate to Shukarpur in Punjab, where tragedy struck once more as she lost one of her children in the traumatic journey to the Punjab. She finally arrived and began to build her new life with her three surviving children Iqbal, Avtar and Surjit, and her extended family.

The Indian Government at the time provided widows with sewing machines, and so she learned to stitch and sell clothing. All the money she would earn was saved purely for her children’s sake and she managed to educate them with the help of her brother.

In 1966, she migrated to Southall, England to live with her son-in-law and daughter, Ajit Singh Rai and Surjit Kaur Rai. However, she faced another ordeal, the death of her daughter Surjit, in 1972 who was diagnosed with kidney failure. So, at the age of 74, her strength and determination rose again, as she made the commitment to raise her four grandchildren as her own, particularly the twins who were six years old at the time.

In 1998 Sant Kaur Bajwa reached her landmark centenary. Sant Kaur was born before the first aeroplane was invented, the first radio transmission and the discovery of penicillin.

West London based Sant Kaur Bajwa, who at the age of 115 years and 199 days, was officially the UK’s oldest and the world’s 2nd oldest person, passed away of natural causes, on Friday 19th July.

Sant Kaur Bajwa was born on 1st January 1898 in Sialkote, Punjab, (in what is now Pakistan), in a small village called Monde ke Mazeera. She lived through three centuries,two World Wars, the Industrial and Technological revolutions, and outlived a total of six monarchs and 27 Prime Ministers of England.

Despite her tough childhood, having lost both parents young, she was raised by her older sister who helped her become the woman that she is today. At the age of 16, she married a farmer and gave birth to four children. Unfortunately further tragedy followed Sant Kaur, with the death of her husband Munsha Singh six years after her marriage in 1914.